Starting Messmer fight locks you out of two quests, great...

[CastielArch]

We are hitting peak stupid quest design here, the simple fact of traversing the fog door of Messmer (which you have no real way of knowing it's his boss room specificaly) triggers a quest Hornsent having his summon sign in the boss arena to go to the next stage, locking another quest helping Leda kill him or defending him from Leda via summon signs from being compleated the red and gold summon signs simply don't appear anymore , and with that quest locked you can't do a following quest Leda wanting to kill Ansbach
Absolutly stupid and terrible quest design, 50h in the DLC and I still get locked from doing quests despite refusing to kill story bosses until I have searched everything...

[Weedsmell]

i lost the first signs too but it doesn't lock you out of ansbach quest, you can still do that part (i just did it today)

[rparham685]

Oof. I'm about to cross that threshold myself. >.<

[LoVeSuns]

Yeah, it's pretty ♥♥♥♥.

[Vinnolo]

i think its more dumb that you lose freyja shield if you give ansbach the scroll before speaking the freyja in the 7th floor of the shadow keep

[CastielArch]

Originally posted by Vinnolo:

i think its more dumb that you lose freyja shield if you give ansbach the scroll before speaking the freyja in the 7th floor of the shadow keep

Yeah, that too. They need to clean the spaghetti code for the quests, it's far too easy to break multiple of them. As I said, I've killed the strict minimum of story bosses, only doing the shadow keep after ~30h of play, and 20h later even tho I have killed no main boss in that time I still get locked out of a quest because I entered a boss room, this is some heavy ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥...

[McJaylyn]

I started the Messmer fight multiple times, then thought to go back and make sure I didn't miss anything. I was able to complete the quests that you are referring to with no issues including both invasions to help Leda. Entering the final boss arena didn't seem to lock me out of anything.

[Zoid13]

no it doesn't lock you out.
whys that stupid quest design? its options and branching quests. and you can still 100% do Leda wanting to kill Ansbach (i just did)
helping kill hornsent OR helping hornsent kill Mesmer then makes Leda go after Ansbach as the next person on her list. you can do either and shell still go after Ansbach next.

talking to leda after you kill mesmer with hornsent OR you kill hornsent shell tell you shes after ansbach now.

you can also intentionally skip the leda / hornsent fight. this way you can do hornsents quest with mesmer and after that you can continue leda's quest (where she now targets ansbach

fighting with / against ansbach and leda runes happen after you give him what he wants. if you want to kill him hell drop the letter for freyja. regardless what you do hell drop his bow too

killing hornsent makes it so you cant summon him in the boss fight. and you get his loot early instead of later. and then leda tells you shes now targeting ansbach

freyja's shield isn't miss-able. if you dont give her Ansbacks letter shell just sit in that room till the games done. once the games complete you can go there and shell be gone with the shield lootable.

its amazing quest design! many options and outcomes (boo hoo you cant get ALL the loot in 1 go)
ur on crack if you think these quests are designed poorly

Originally posted by McJaylyn:

I started the Messmer fight multiple times, then thought to go back and make sure I didn't miss anything. I was able to complete the quests that you are referring to with no issues including both invasions to help Leda.
Entering the final boss arena didn't seem to lock me out of anything.

^

[SotiCoto]

Look on the bright side. At least this isn't like Baldur's Gate 3 where entire questlines can be ruined by RNG and set items become inaccessible because you didn't pick them up from their hidden location in the narrow window of opportunity presented for you to loot the place. Where literally the only freedom of choice you have is to screw yourself over mechanically.

[CastielArch]

Originally posted by SotiCoto:

Look on the bright side. At least this isn't like Baldur's Gate 3 where entire questlines can be ruined by RNG and set items become inaccessible because you didn't pick them up from their hidden location in the narrow window of opportunity presented for you to loot the place. Where literally the only freedom of choice you have is to screw yourself over mechanically.

I'm far more ok with that kind of things in BG3 because it's an actual Role-Playing game and because since the gear has a power progression, most of the stuff you get will get out-classed at some point down the line, while in a FromSoft game you're literaly just missing options and have to do a whole NG cycle to get it (2 in the case of Leda's quest) so instead of being able to use all the DLC equipment in NG+ I'll now only be able to use them in NG2+...

[Bankai9212]

Originally posted by SotiCoto:

Look on the bright side. At least this isn't like Baldur's Gate 3 where entire questlines can be ruined by RNG and set items become inaccessible because you didn't pick them up from their hidden location in the narrow window of opportunity presented for you to loot the place. Where literally the only freedom of choice you have is to screw yourself over mechanically.

Bg3 you can at least keep backup saves in places. While you technically can in from soft it’s not intended and if you screw up at least for elden ring that’s 80 hours you need to repeat or at least 40 if you want to rush to the dlc.

[Brma]

If you don't know Messmer is a boss fight it's either your first soulsboss ever or you're very very unaware of things around you.

[Bankai9212]

Originally posted by Brma:

If you don't know Messmer is a boss fight it's either your first soulsboss ever or you're very very unaware of things around you.

Not really the point, it has to do with characters quests you the player won’t know or given any hints it’s tied to said boss.

[CastielArch]

Originally posted by Brma:

If you don't know Messmer is a boss fight it's either your first soulsboss ever or you're very very unaware of things around you.

There's nothing indicating you're about to fight Messmer, his small fog door is after a small flight of stairs and a small square room, there's nothing in his fog door screaming major boss, you compleatly missunderstood my post. I'm aware Messmer is a boss, but unless I spoil myself there's nothing indicating that is his boss room, the hyppo fog door looks more like you're about to fight him than the toilet stall that stands as his boss entrance.

[Bankai9212]

Originally posted by CastielArch:

Originally posted by Brma:

If you don't know Messmer is a boss fight it's either your first soulsboss ever or you're very very unaware of things around you.

There's nothing indicating you're about to fight Messmer, his small fog door is after a small flight of stairs and a small square room, there's nothing in his fog door screaming major boss, you compleatly missunderstood my post. I'm aware Messmer is a boss, but unless I spoil myself there's nothing indicating that is his boss room, the hyppo fog door looks more like you're about to fight him than the toilet stall that stands as his boss entrance.

I think most would agree with how long and big elden ring is looking at guides for npc quests is fine.

[Action Man]

This isn't peak FromSoft quest design. This is standard FromSoft quest design.

I missed the Hornsent quest because I entered the Keep from the Church side - I either missed Hornsent's summon or it didn't show because I entered the arena from a different door. I was still able to do Ansbach's quest though.